Abstract : The investigation sought and evaluated methods for the design of an automatic print reading device to convert technical Russian documents to machine-readable form. Five sub-studies were conducted in the course of the investigation. These included the development of a statistical model, the selection of a transport and a scanner and the examination of pre- and post-processing techniques as well as several recognition algorithms. It is concluded that an automatic reading device is indeed feasible and that the majority of the device component parts can be obtained as off-the-shelf items. It is recommended that any further development be preceded by an operations analysis of the entire system, that realistic rather than simulated equipment and data be tested and that testing be extensive enough to discern the majority of operational idiosyncracies. It is further recommended that this analysis be performed by means of a small computer configuration with several peripherals such as a flying spot scanner with a microfilm transport, on-line interactive display units and mass disk storage. (Author)